Black Beaded Dress

Polynesian dressing for the Millennium

Lindah Lepou made this ensemble, which comprises a kimono-inspired bomber jacket and black beaded lace dress, for the Avant garde section of the Benson & Hedges Fashion Design Awards in 1997. Combining inspiration from Samoan, European and Japanese dress traditions, the look was described as ‘Polynesian dressing for the Millennium’.

Lindah Lepou

Lindah Lepou is an award-winning artist, of Samoan and New Zealand descent, who works across music, film, costume design and fashion.

Over the last 25 years she has forged a reputation for her conceptually driven, one off garments, in which she combines Samoan and European influences, including her identity as fa'afafine. She has termed her style ‘Pacific Couture’.  Lindah Lepou’s work is reflective of her heritage and working in the vā, the space in-between that she inhabits; in-between genders, cultures, ideologies and worlds.

In 2022 she received the inaugural Arts Foundation Te Tumu Toi “Toi Kō Iriiri” queer arts award in celebration of an outstanding artist or group of artists whose practice has a meaningful impact on the queer community.